Photos: Lincoln 20 Years After the Unabomber Arrest

Twenty years ago, on April 3, 1996, the small community of Lincoln, Montana became the epicenter of the biggest media story in the world when the FBI arrested a local, unkempt loner named Theodore J. Kaczynski at his primitive cabin outside town and charged him with being the serial terrorist known as the Unabomber.

Locals could barely believe at first that Kaczynski, who was known by some and disliked by others, was the person responsible for a 17-year nationwide bombing campaign that killed three people and injured 23 more.

As national and international media descended on Lincoln, it's residents found themselves in the middle of a frenzied scramble by news agencies looking for any information about Kaczynski.

Today, the Unabomber story is largely history to the town of Lincoln. Some of its residents talked with the Missoulian about the events of 20 years ago, and provided a tour of Kaczynski's former property outside town.

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Wendy Gehring stands on the property formerly owned by Kaczynski on Stemple Pass Road outside Lincoln, where a chain link fence still surrounds the piece of ground where his cabin stood. Gehring still owns the property surrounding the site, and she and her husband, Butch, operated a sawmill nearby.

TOM BAUER/Missoulian

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Kaczynski's root cellar still stands on the site, surrounded by chain link fencing and barbed wire. Wendy Gehring, the nearby property owner and former neighbor of Kaczynski, thinks the fencing was originally installed to preserve evidence, and has never been removed by numerous subsequent owners.

TOM BAUER/Missoulian

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Jerry Burns, a retired U.S. Forest Service law enforcement officer, looks through a box of papers related to Kaczynski's arrest 20 years ago. Burns grabbed Kaczynski's wrist through the door of his cabin when undercover agents knocked the day of the arrest.

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Sherri Wood, the librarian at Lincoln's library, recounts recently the frenzy that descended on the town 20 years ago when Ted Kaczynski, a local recluse who lived in a shack outside town, was arrested as the Unabomber, a serial terrorist sought by the FBI. Wood arguably knew Kaczynski as well as anyone from his frequent trips to the library, and she says that after his arrest, tourists would come into the building and touch walls and shelves, wondering aloud if Kaczynski had touched the same surfaces.

TOM BAUER/Missoulian

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Jerry Burns, who lives on the outskirts of Lincoln, recalls that for a long time after the arrest he would see people stop their cars and have their picture taken under this sign wearing a hoody and sunglasses reminiscent of the famous Unabomber FBI wanted poster.

TOM BAUER/Missoulian

1995: The Unabomber

In 1995, the final bomb linked to the Unabomber exploded inside the Sacramento, California, offices of a lobbying group for the wood products industry, killing chief lobbyist Gilbert B. Murray. (Theodore Kaczynski was later sentenced to four lifetimes in prison for a series of bombings that killed three men and injured 29 others.)

Anonymous

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Teresa Garland, who now runs a flower shop and gift store in Lincoln with her sister, recounts some of her interactions with Kaczynski and the effects of the media on the town after his arrest. Garland worked at the general store owned by her family in Lincoln.

TOM BAUER/Missoulian

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Wendy Gehring said she never liked or trusted Kaczynski when he lived nearby the home and sawmill she ran with her husband Butch 20 years ago. Only after he was arrested did the Gehrings find out from some of Kazynski's diaries that he had vandalized their machinery and stolen car parts from them to use in his bombs.

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A throng of media congregate on Stemple Pass Road a few days after Kaczynski's arrest in April 1996. The small town of Lincoln was innundated with national and international news organizations during the event.

Sketch: Unabomber appears in federal court with a public defender

Healing town: Lincoln coping with its Unabomber past

Photos provided The photo at left shows the Kaczynski cabin before federal authorities hauled it away for evidence. The photo at right shows the chain link fence that now surrounds the property. One thing that still remains is a protective structure made of wooden poles Kaczynski built to protect a growing tree shown in the right corner of both pictures.